system is falling apart - new virus?

[Nikko]

I got home yesterday to find my computer acting strangely. It seems to have
been in the middle of a defrag operation (using O&O Defrag) when it froze
up. I had to hold down the power button to turn it off. After multiple
loooooooooooooong attempts at rebooting, it finally booted up, but my system
is all screwy.

The first thing I noticed is that the password sign-on screen had reverted
to classic mode (i.e. I now had to type in my user name and my password,
whereas before I just had to put in my password). Not a big deal, but kind
of strange since I hadn't changed it. More troubling is that the system is
extremely slow to respond and certain things don't work at all.
Specifically, I can't get task manager to come up. I tried every way I know
to bring it up and it just won't work. I also tried to bring up system
restore and that won't work. Ditto with Help & Support.

Also weird is that my torrents directory is missing some files. Only file
names that start with an A through G are there. Everything else is missing.

Is there some new virus that I should be aware of that would have done all
this? I'm running XP SP2 with a firewall turned on. I have the latest
version of Anti-Vir Guard installed. I did a scan but it came back clear.

Any ideas on what might have happened to my system? More importantly, any
ideas on how to fix it? Or is a reinstall my only option?

 

[Colin Barnhorst]

Navigate to McAfee's website and use the online virus scan. Run antispyware
programs and see what turns up. Given the problem with the defragger, it is
more likely that one or more system files are corrupt. You should make sure
your system is reasonably clean before fixing the system files, but I would
start with the System File Checker. See:
http://www.microsoft.com/resources/...0/server/reskit/en-us/prork/pref_tts_paix.asp

 

[André Gulliksen]

Nikko wrote:
[defrag gone wrong and missing files]

Is there some new virus that I should be aware of that would have
done all this? I'm running XP SP2 with a firewall turned on. I have
the latest version of Anti-Vir Guard installed. I did a scan but it
came back clear.
Any ideas on what might have happened to my system? More importantly,
any ideas on how to fix it? Or is a reinstall my only option?

Most likely this is related to your defrag. This can cause missing files
and/or a corrupt file system. If Colins tip does not help you might want to
try an in-place repair installation. But I would still be sceptical to
wether or not your file system still holds potential problems. So to be safe
I would back up the data I wanted to keep, also try a few tools to recover
the files you are missing (someone else might help you here) and then do a
full reformat and reinstall. Repairing your existing installation _might_
work, but I would make damn sure the system is squeky-clean before I
continued business as usual.